How to Make the Most out of your Next Business Meeting.
July 30, 2018 by Staff
Filed under Education, Money/Business, Weekly Columns
(Akiit.com) Meetings can really drain your time. If you manage to accomplish nothing during your meeting then this can lead to a ton of frustration and this is the last thing that you need. People may stop coming to the meetings that you host and you may even find that people don’t even have an interest in what you have to say either.
Know what You Need to Accomplish
It’s so important that you enter every single meeting with a goal. You may even want to write down a list of goals that you want to accomplish before you host your meeting, and even the people that you need to speak to if you want to achieve that goal. This will help you to make sure that you are only inviting the people who are essential to the meeting.
Write a Summary
It also helps to write a summary of the business meeting that you are going to have. Before the meeting starts out, you need to create a summary of the points that you are going to cover and the main reason for this is because it helps your team to know what to expect. This can also help to alleviate any anxieties that they have as well, so there really are more reasons for you to do it than not.
Don’t Stray from the Topic of Conversation
When there are a lot of people in an informal meeting, sometimes it can be difficult for you to stay on one specific topic. If you find that you are constantly going off topic then this won’t help you out at all. If someone else in the meeting starts going off-topic then kindly bring them back to the first thing that you intended to discuss. This will really help you to know that the meeting is going well and it will also help you to remind people what you are there for as well.
Don’t Turn your Back
If you have a whiteboard or even a chalkboard then you will need to turn your back on your team every time you want to put something on the board. This can cause them to lose concentration because you are not constantly engaging them. If you want to put an end to this then one thing that you can do is try and invest in some technology such as a laptop or a projector. This can help you to automate the whole process and it will also make it much easier for you to engage your team.
Choose the Right Space
If you don’t choose the right space to host your meeting then you can’t ever hope to really get the best result out of it. You may want to invest in some flexible learning spaces as well as this will help you to boost the concentration of your team. You’ll also want to try and work with them to make sure that you are giving them the support they need to contribute to the meeting as well, such as encouraging them to speak out and even interacting with them at various points.
Staff Writer; Gary Ford